said Philip's brother, with perfect calmness. | story than that when I said, "Why did you not "There has been an error; it shall be correct call me to accompany you, Rose?" she only ed. I am no murderer, and for this accident blushed, and said, " Because, mamma, bewill make due reparation. For you," and here cause-somehow he seemed to belong to me he turned to his brother, "I know that you alone." will not detain me-believe me for once, I will atone. To-morrow seek me where I came from, and I shall surely be there." And he went without another word, no hand being raised against him. But when to-morrow came and Philip sought him he found not what he sought. He found a dead body; upon the ground a mile away he found, with its hand grasping the pistol that had wounded my darling, what was once his brother.

There is little more to tell. The narration by Rose of how she heard a noise outside our house, and caught a glimpse of the man and his weapon-how she also heard him muttering of vengeance, and, fearing she knew not what, followed him-need not be repeated here. Nor will I set down more of this latter part of her

No. There is little more to tell. There were secrets to keep, and we kept them. Rose recovered all the more quickly that Philip was always with her. They were married-it's. years ago; and I have little friends who call me grandmother. There was one secret to keep, and I kept that-thankful that it was mine alone. Only once did I shed tears even. It was when she said to me one day, "Oh, mother, if he had died that night I should have died too!" This I know to be a common enough feeling; but grief does not kill-it is the living death that is to be dreaded. Am. I not alive? and can I not now-yes, with a clear brow, too, and an honest love-lay my hands upon his shoulders, and looking into his grave, kind eyes, say to him, "Dear Philip!"

WARFARE OF MODERN RELIG

IOUS THOUGHT.

IGHTEEN centuries have borne the name

| occupying this ground, its existence for eighteen centuries would be the most puzzling problem ever offered to the mind of man.

But when consider the supernatural as

EIG ONE Lord Jesus Christ, and testified to pects of Christianity we can instantly see how

the fact that He introduced a new life into the it has been destined to eighteen hundred years heart of the world. One would think, there- of warfare. Unaccountable as this protracted fore, that Christianity had been long enough and unrelenting strife would be, if it had proamong men to exhaust adverse criticism and posed a sway less magnificent than universal vindicate its claims to a divine origin. Unlike rule, or dealt with interests less sublime than those phenomena of the universe that return the legal and moral recovery of a ruined race, only at vast intervals of time, it has constantly it becomes clear enough the moment we apprechallenged the eye of mankind as the highest, hend the true office of Christianity as a final the most authoritative, the most urgent concern and authoritative message from Jehovah. The within the compass of thought. And, looking very grandeur of its pretensions, the omniscient merely at this aspect of its position, our first searching of its eye, the omnipotent grasp of impulse is to conclude that Christianity ought its hand, the splendid accompaniments that now to be far beyond assault, and to enjoy un-attended its advent, the majestic step that at disturbed repose. So it would be if it were less like God and more like man. Imagine it a simple formula of truth, a science among sciences, a co-ordinate authority beside other authorities, and long since the struggle between it and its adversaries had been ended.

first crushed the pomps of earth, and the yet more majestic look that withered the glories of palace and crown, its constant assertion of God's infinite rights, and its constant hostility to sin's infinite wrongs-these are the reasons Christianity has been doomed to undergo a ceaseless struggle. How could it have been otherwise? The natural tendency of reason is to resist whatever appeals to it as lying beyond its own province. Left to itself, its instinct is to magnify its office, to reject mysteries enforced on its reception, not by explanation, but by direct author

supremacy within its own realm to extend its jurisdiction beyond that restricted domain. The mind has its fixed functions, and whenever objects address those functions in the form of a supernatural revelation a barrier must be overleaped, old habits transcended, and a new order of thought instituted. So much for the reason as reason; but add to that the influence of the moral sensibilities aroused to confront God's broken law, and it can not appear strange the Christianity should wage an interminable warfare. Yes; had Christianity been the outgrowth of the human mind, every advance made would have been permanent. A victory over a foe would have been final. Once driven from the field, no more would have been heard of Hobbes, Hume, Voltaire, and none would have dared to gather up their dishonored armor and renew the fight. But Christianity is an external revelation; it humbles our pride of intellect; it humbles us under a sense of our feeble intuitions as well as under a sense of our sins; and hence it is never permitted to repose on its victories; but its conquests today are signals for another fierce strife to-morrow. It gives a Sabbath to the world, but takes none for itself.

Homer's genius is undisputed. Dante, Shakspeare, and Milton abide in unapproachable grandeur, and rest securely amidst the honors they won. No one puts forth an effort to dislodge Newton from that firmament to which he lifted the science of the world; and if a man were to assail the heroism, the self-sacrifice, the inflex-ity, and to take advantage of a certain kind of ible devotion of Washington, the concurrent voices of all nations would pronounce him an outcast from the brotherhood of humanity. And yet the fact meets us every where that hundreds of men reject the character and offices of Christ, unable, they say, to see the evidences of his Deity, and in many instances refusing to accept him in any sense as a Teacher sent from God. If now we turn from a comparison between the manhood of Christ and the manhood of those distinguished by an outstanding attitude among their fellow-men, and transfer the same train of thought to Christianity, we find that a similar state of facts exists. The scientific truths which chemistry and astronomy teach are generally accepted, while the proofs of Christianity as a divine religion are disputed, its doctrines resisted, its authority denied. Obviously, then, the position of Jesus Christ and the relations of Christianity are peculiar. They form a class of facts by themselves. On the supposition that Jesus Christ is merely a good man, a noble character, then, the world has not obeyed its instincts in honoring him as it has done its other illustrious servants. On the theory that Christianity is only an enlarged and perfected form of natural theology, then, the world has departed from its habitual course of action in not yield- The bare fact, then, that Christianity asing to its scientific claims. Human nature has, sumes a militant air in the presence of each therefore, violently wrenched itself out of its generation indicates whence it came, and what legitimate and usual modes of thinking, feel- its purpose. If it has existed for eighteen cening, acting; and if in so doing it has not turies, we are not to think that it has had ample wrought a miracle on itself, it has neverthe- time to subdue the prejudices, silence the cavils, less presented a strange and most perplexing appease the passions of men. Time it has had anomaly. Had we to view revealed religion as to offer its credentials for strictest scrutiny;

timents. For just as long as the difference between them is not a difference in degree but in kind, so long as the breach that separates them is not dependent on circumstances but is a measure of positive contrariety, so long as neither the advance of external science nor the inward culture of the intuitions of the mind can meet a single exigency in the case, just so long must the antagonism last, unless removed by other instrumentalities. The simple truth is, that they are belligerents, not because of the accidents that perpetually vary the moods of men and their connection with outward things, but because of their respective natures. Incidental matters may give a certain turn to the controversy, but the controversy itself is not an incidental matter. Geology yesterday, Statistics to-day, the "Origin of Species" to-morrow, may complicate the argument; but had Science never been known the essence of the argument would not have been different. The intellect is only the muster-ground on which these hostile forces drill; while the heart, alien from God, alien from its own instincts, is the real battle-field where this great struggle day by day goes forward. And hence it is folly to expect that the progress of years, as such, will change the conditions of this ancient and deepseated controversy.

time to vary its adaptations to social changes; wisdom and human wisdom-each retaining its time to combat new issues as they have emerged characteristics-may meet and reciprocate senfrom the troubled depths of the world's growing consciousness; time, too, to assert its regal majesty in the face of every arrogant rival that the progress of civilization has thrown in its way: but it has not had time to be other than Christianity, or to do any work God never set it to accomplish. Let us remember what Christianity is here-not to do. Never was it designed that Christ's religion should forestall the sentiments of one generation by a triumph over the generation preceding it; nor can it be that the evidences of its divine authenticity should so accumulate in any one age as to sweep with a resistless momentum through the ages following. The grand scheme instituted for the world's trial demands, as its first condition of activity, that each generation should stand on its own ground, and work out, uncontrolled, its own particular destiny. One might almost say that it is a succession of worlds in the shape of generations-each by itself, each for itself—with which Christianity is thus solemnly in contact. Our forefathers help us in the outside frame-work of civilization; but here, in this momentous trial, we are alone. Moreover, each age incorporates elements into this warfare never before known; and thus Providence-always on the side of a fair and full investigation-affords unbelief a lengthened series of opportunities to diversify its argument, and to exhibit it in every phase of which it is susceptible. And the same law that applies to generations applies to individuals. Every man, if intent on thoroughness in his religious life, must ascertain the meaning of Christianity for himself; not only viewing it as what it is to him as a member of society, but in a far deeper and more comprehensive sense as seen from his own constitution, temperament, and personal peculiarities. Now, then, when we take this vast scheme of trial, its proportions so immense as to encompass the whole earth and to lose themselves in the heavens above our heads, it wears an infinitely impressive aspect from the fact that generations and individuals, one by one, must solve for themselves this profound problem. If the past were suffered to aggregate in massive shapes its moral and spiritual influences, and thus concentrate them on us, certain it is that the prestige of hereditary authority would impair, or perchance destroy, the prerogatives of independent thought and selfwill.

Still another aspect belongs to this law of probationary being. Man may grow in knowledge, but this can not radically affect the conditions under which his trial for immortality must proceed. Ages after ages may elapse; man may reach the highest summit of material civilization, and, in proud enthronement as lord of this lower creation, every physical force may submit to his will, and every secret of Nature pour its long-treasured wisdom into his bosom, and yet not the slightest apprehension be made toward any common ground on which divine

It

Surprise is often expressed that men of Faith and men of Science are not yet reconciled. is time, say many, that the old feud was healed and good fellowship set up between them. And doubtless it is time; but on what basis shall they meet and exchange salutations of friendship? We see no common ground on which Science as Science, and Christianity as Christianity can come together. There is really no more common ground between them than between Christianity and Mohammedanism. And by this we mean, that truth as an object of faith and truth as an object of reason are essentially distinct things in their relations to the mind, nor can they approach it in the same way and exert over it the same kind of influence. If they are harmonized it must be as superior and inferior, as divine and human, each preserving its own attributes, each abiding in its own sphere-one as sovereign, the other as subject. The idea is preposterous that Christianity can remain the religion of Christ and yet resign its claims to a supernatural origin and character. But if it is supernatural, it must find its antithesis in the natural facts of the human mind, and by contrast with them -a contrast spreading over its entire surface, and penetrating its profoundest depths—maintain and illustrate and enforce its dignity and authority as God's message. Nor can we mark too attentively the manner in which Christianity presents its miraculous aspects to man. The senses, through which intellect takes cognizance of the outer world, are not overpowered. No eye is blinded by flashing splendors,

nearness.

But it is not strange that Infidelity and semi

no ear deafened by thunder, no one's daily path | Bethlehem." History portrays the vicissitudes thronged with exciting wonders, no business of an orphaned race doomed to struggle with interrupted, no home less a home. The super-laws that have no Lawgiver. A splendid Cosnatural glides into the world, and, without vio- mos is reared, gorgeous with suns that from lence or dismay, introduces a new order of Di- distant points send their beams to blend in one vine manifestations. But this restraint on an magnificent day, but no spot is found in all the energy that might shake the earth or convulse illumined and far-reaching space for the Throne the universe, this stern limitation in the use of of Mediation; no footstool on which penitence power that commanded infinite resources, is the may kneel and weep; no firmament embosombest conceivable way to present the intrinsic ing the serene blessedness of the Sabbath; no difference between human reason and Chris- pavilion of glory in which angels may hold their tianity. The miracles, viewed in this light, festivals of joy, and to which they may welcome assume their true aspect, disclose their nature the saintly worth that death had dismissed from as evidences, and demonstrate that God is met- the sorrows of earth. ing out precisely such a measure of signs and wonders as shall establish the facts of Chris-Infidelity should have developed themselves in tianity. The healing of the sick, the raising such imposing forms. It were a poor compliof the dead, and similar works, are miracles to ment to Christianity if its opponents were not the senses, while the truths taught are miracles wiser than their predecessors. Under the to the heart; but in each case, although the guidance of Christianity the world has admind is differently approached, it is alike in-vanced, and its enemies share in the benefits structed to form an humble estimate of itself, of this progress. The depth of the shadow and to prostrate its faculties before the august measures the brilliancy of the light, and hence, majesty of Him who is equally God of the instead of drawing conclusions from the presworld without and of the world within. The ent state of things unfavorable to the position use of miracles shows how far the human spirit of Christianity, we should view it as a decided has sunk in unbelief; and at the same time the indication that it is accomplishing its divine thoughtful reserve, the careful avoidance of ex- work. Nor should another point be overlooked. cess in these tokens of the divine presence, also 'Skepticism is taking a broad range. Nothing evince that it was needful to consult the imper- in its present history is more characteristic of fections of reason, lest, indeed, it be overpower- its spirit than the immense field it is undertaked by the signal demonstrations of God's awful ing to cover. But perchance this may prove the occasion of a most humiliating defeat. The Looking, then, at the facts as they exist, real problem is not whether Christianity shall nothing can be clearer than that the conditions have a mere foothold on the earth; but whethof this controversy have not virtually changed. er, as an aggressive and dominant power, it We see plainly, as a matter of common observ-shall have universal sway. Over this problem ation, that the progress of knowledge has not really augmented the force of the "Christian Evidences," nor diminished the opposition of the carnal intellect to the authority of Revela- Speculation aside, we are on the eve of tion. We see that expansion of mind is not troubled times. All around us men are lapsrenewal of mind. The coarse earth is yet in ing from the stern and profound form of faith our veins, and the pure atmosphere of a re-into creeds of religiousness more flattering to deemed world has not effected the arterializa-human pride than genuine and decided Christion of our blood. Naturalism and Supernaturalism are as wide asunder as ever; a miracle stands precisely where it always stood; men still idolize the sequences of Nature, and enslave Deity to his own laws; and after all the beautiful and impressive exemplifications of wisdom and benevolence in Bridgewater Treatises and kindred works, we do not find that the natural heart is any closer to God. Raphael has painted Madonnas and Milton sung of Par-evangelists were equally inspired in their writadise Regained, and yet the "offense of the ings and their lives, and in both received the cross" has not ceased. Ay, more, the great guidance of the Spirit of Truth in a manner not debate was never so significant as now. Sci- different in kind, but only in degree, from ordience offers a more defiant front to Christianity nary Christians;" who demand "a philosophicthan ever before. Philosophy arrays conscious- al rendering" of the Scriptures; and who assert, ness against revealed religion, and denies their moreover, that "we neither have, nor can have, compatibility. Statistics rule faith out of the any evidence of a Deity working miracles," in world. The hammer of Geology rings on the so far as that evidence is "in nature and from shields of Christian warriors; while the tele-nature by science and by reason." Hume mainscope of Astronomy, searching the sky for new tained the impossibility of a miracle, but destars, scorns to catch a ray from the "Star of clared, "Our holy religion is founded not on

we have slumbered. But under the goads of skepticism we have been aroused at last to solve it.

tianity. Skepticism is not now a mere outside antagonist, surrounding the battlements of the Church, and threatening with boastful words to subvert its foundations. Among the professed friends of Christianity-men who claim to love its discipleship, and who hope to be saved through the transforming agency of its spirit-are found scores who speak of the "fiction of an external revelation ;" who declare that the "apostles and